Washington, D.C., September 28, 2011 – The Environmental Protection Agency’s Inspector General has found that the agency based its 2009 “Endangerment Finding” on a flawed and inadequate assessment of climate science.

The IG’s report, released today, provides support to claims by Senator James M. Inhofe, (R-Okla.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, CEI, and many others that the EPA’s justification for its decision to regulate greenhouse gas emissions using the Clean Air Act relied on politically-biased science that does not meet minimal federal Information Quality Act requirements for objectivity.

“The Inspector General’s report requested by Senator Inhofe is just the latest evidence that the EPA is relying on junk science, bending the rules, and ignoring its own procedures in order to do whatever the White House wants them to do,” said Myron Ebell[2], Director of CEI’s Center on Energy and Environment. “Under President Obama, the EPA has become a lawless agency.”

“The EPA avoided rigorous peer review of its endangerment finding Technical Support Document by not classifying it as a ‘highly influential’ scientific document,” said Marlo Lewis[3], CEI Senior Fellow. “In fact, the TSD may be the most influential document claiming scientific content any U.S. government agency has ever produced. It is the scientific rationale for EPA’s audacious – and congressionally unauthorized – project to de-carbonize the U.S. economy.”

“The EPA failed – or refused – to comply with the legal standards required of federal agencies, standards that are crucial because of serious impact regulations can have on the economy,” said Christopher Horner[4], CEI Senior Fellow.

“This is not the first time an activist administration has been reprimanded for producing junk climate science,” Horner added. “As a result of a lawsuit brought by CEI, Senator James Inhofe, and others, the Clinton/Gore administration put a disclaimer on the National Assessment on Climate Change that the report had not been subjected to the requirements of the Federal Information Quality Act.”

According to Sen. Inhofe, the Office of Budget and Management requires complete record-keeping of all documents leading up to such a major regulatory decision, along with a thorough review of the science by an impartial panel. Yet, the EPA neglected to identify from the outset if the endangerment finding – the Technical Support Document - amounted to a highly influential scientific assessment. The EPA’s endangerment finding concluded that greenhouse gas emissions endanger public health and welfare and, therefore, compelled the agency to regulate such emissions as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act.